


Valebrook Farm (DISCONTINUED)

by orphan_account



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bucky Barnes Has Nightmares, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Civil War Team Captain America, Clint Barton & Darcy Lewis Friendship, Darcy Lewis Is a Good Bro, Darcy Lewis is Tony Stark's Daughter, Darcy Lewis is the fandom bicycle and I love it, Developing Relationship, Domestic Fluff, Dysfunctional Family, Everyone Has Issues, F/M, Farmer Darcy Lewis, Healthy Relationships, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Safehouses, Slow Burn, Steve Rogers Feels, Wanda Maximoff Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:08:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25265125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Following the fallout of the Sokovia Accords and being officially declared war criminals and fugitives of the World Security Council, Clint is forced to face the fact that he might just be the only member of his team with a decent contingency plan.Herein lies a story of blossoming friendship and of love -- of forgiveness, loss, and healing.
Relationships: Clint Barton & Darcy Lewis, Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Darcy Lewis/Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Darcy Lewis, James "Bucky" Barnes/Darcy Lewis/Steve Rogers
Comments: 31
Kudos: 177





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to Valebrook Farm. Inspired majorly by a dainty little farm I visited a few weeks ago, this fic has been in the process of fabrication for just over a fortnight. Be prepared for a hell of a slow burn, for heartbreakingly raw friendships to be built, for a healthy dose of angst and enough fluff to wrap around the world twice. 
> 
> Feedback is always appreciated; to incorrectly quote Twilight, comments are my own personal brand of heroin. 
> 
> Without further ado, enjoy!

There’s a heavy tension hanging over their heads. Nobody knows what to say, so nobody says anything at all. In a nutshell, they're all revelling a bittersweet victory. They were free from the raft, sure, but as a consequence, they'd been declared the most wanted fugitives in the world. Which, of course, meant they were being hunted by every institution of power the WSC had chartered. Knowing they were facing a lifetime on the run, it wasn't surprising that they were struggling to accept their fate.

Clint taps his index finger against his knee and eyes the remnants of his team. 

Wanda has been curled up in a ball in the corner of one of the derelict railcars for the past two days. The only time she's responsive is when one of them, usually Sam, succeeds in convincing her to eat something. Clint has woken up to the sounds of her muffled sobs more than once. His heart twists for the kid every time he looks at her. Whatever they’d done to her on the raft had obviously messed her up; big time. 

Steve was restless. Clint hasn’t seen him take a minute to breathe since he’d freed them out from the raft. The dark circles under his eyes are getting darker every day. He's losing hope, Clint can see the light in his eyes dimming, but he's doing everything in his power to stay prolific. If he wasn’t conversing mutely with Barnes in the shadows the ex-assassin has claimed as his own, he's discussing strategies with Sam. He's a born leader. Even in his darkest moment, he refuses to give up on his team. 

Barnes is quiet. If it wasn’t for Steve’s efforts to pull him into the conversation at every opportunity, he easily goes forgotten. Sometimes Clint forgets he's lurking in the shadows and practically has a heart attack when he suddenly decides to switch vantage points. 

Sam is, well, he's everywhere. His experience with veterans comes in mighty handy in terms of Wanda’s instability. Sure, she's not a soldier, not by definition, but she's a kid who’s been through hell, and Sam has far more experience with approaching that level of trauma than the rest of them. 

The sound of a knife being sheathed pulls Clint out of his head. He turns around, greeting Natasha with a lopsided smirk. Her ‘ditsy blonde’ disguise would never get old. 

Nat had been in this situation before, that much was clear. She was almost scarily relaxed about her status as fugitive, not even a little frazzled by the rank. That didn’t mean she wasn’t strategizing, though. Not only that, but her experience was, possibly, the only thing keeping them from running straight into the arms of the WSC. Other than Barnes, none of them knew much about evading governmental agencies. 

Steve and Sam halt their in-sync pacing at Natasha’s reappearance. It’d been two hours since she’d left to gather supplies, and even though Clint knew better than to worry about her, it was clear that they'd started to fret, despite Clint's untroubled attitude. 

Wanda doesn’t show any signs of retreating from her corner, and Barnes doesn’t move a muscle. 

Clint stands up from the concrete step and brushes down his pants. Natasha slides across the platform and hands over one of the plastic bags. The other two, bigger bags, are passed over to Steve. “I got what I could. We were on the news again. Nothing good, but they’ve not put a kill-order on us yet, so there’s that.” 

Sam huffs out a rough laugh, reaching a hand up to scratch his facial hair. They’re all starting to look, and feel, a bit disjointed. Clint doesn’t think he’s ever seen Steve with a beard as thick as it is now. Supersoldiers grow facial hair at an accelerated speed, apparently. “Yeah. I guess that’s something.” 

Steve thumbs through the grocery bags. “This should carry us through the next few days, but we need to start planning our next move. If we’re sticking together, we need to be smart about it. Might even need to consider getting off of American soil. They don’t seem to want to admit that we have the means to escape the country.” He picks out an apple from the bag and takes a mighty bite. 

“I still can’t get over the fact that Captain America is a fugitive.” Clint snorts. Because yeah, the reality that his childhood hero is officially a criminal is definitely enough to give him a complex. God, he doesn’t even want to start accepting the fact that he, too, is now a literal war criminal. Blinking away the notion of _actually_ facing reality, he pulls a non-packaged burner phone out of the bag Natasha had handed him. He eyes the ancient brick of a device in distaste. “God, Nokia’s are ugly.” 

“They’re resilient.” Natasha contends, tilting her head and narrowing her eyes. He looks away from her piercing gaze. “You going to call her? Or make us suffer for another fortnight before you finally decide to pull your head out of your ass?” 

Sam's head snaps up from the grocery bag. “What are you talking about?” 

Clint chews on the inside of his cheek. His stomach twists with nerves. He ignores Sam and keeps his attention on Natasha. “She might not answer.” 

It’s a weak deflection. Natasha raises her eyebrows in silent amusement. Clint pointedly avoids her gaze. 

Steve looks between them. “You two feel like catching the rest of us up?” 

Clint takes a deep breath. He tosses the phone from his left to right hand absentmindedly. He knows he’s just putting off the inevitable, but it’s difficult to accept the fact that they were actually having to resort to his ‘last-last resort.’ Swallowing, he looks up at Steve. “I think I know a place. We’d be safe there, for a long time.” 

Wanda twitches but everyone is too focused on Clint to notice. Sam squints. “How long is ‘a long time’, Barton?” 

“Months, years. A decade, if we need it.” He taps his foot against the floor and looks up at the cracked ceiling. “It’s off the grid. Safe. I could get us there. It’d take a week, maybe two, but I could do it. Get us there without anyone asking any questions, I mean.” 

Steve frowns and Clint can see the questions eddying around behind his eyes. 

Natasha clears her throat. Clint finally gathers enough nerve to look at her. “You need to call her. We can’t just turn up unannounced. You remember what happened last time, _da_?” 

Scrunching his nose at the memory, he reaches up to scratch the scar on his shoulder. “I’ll try the landline in a few hours. She won’t be awake yet. It’s the middle of the night over there.” 

Steve and Sam share a look.

Sam asks the question they’re both obviously thinking. “Who is she?” 

“Someone we can trust.” Clint purses his lips and looks at Natasha. “You think she’ll say yes?” 

Natasha shrugs, eyes sharp. “Depends how nicely you ask. So, I suggest you ask _very_ nicely. I need a shower, Clinton. And a bed.” 

Clint suppresses an amused smirk, nerves ebbing at her threat. “Yes, ma’am.” 

\---------- 

The high-pitched clucking of the hen's wake Darcy up at the ass-crack of dawn. Moaning, she rolls over and pushes her face into one of the dozens of pillows she owns for no real reason. She lies still, curled around her sheets for a few minutes before she starts to feel herself drifting again. As if on cue, Dasher skids into the bedroom, barking at the top of his lungs. Jolting awake, for real this time, she pushes herself into a sitting position, shoves her hair out of her face and smiles drowsily at the large, bounding English Mastiff. “Alright, alright. You’ve gotta give me a minute, boy. I’ll let you out once I’ve got some clothes on, yeah?” 

It takes her less than ten minutes to get ready for a day of labour. Makeup is unnecessary (she won’t be seeing anyone other than the animals), and there’s no point in having a shower only to muck herself up basically right afterwards. So, donning her beloved denim dungarees, hair tied back in a high ponytail and bright pink wellington boots keeping her feet warm, she pushes open the back door and lets Dasher run wild through the fields while she takes a look at her to-do list. 

It’s warm enough to leave the front door open without worrying about having to heat up the house later on, so she does just that before heading down to the chicken coops. Cooing over them and sprinkling feed onto the grazing grass, she opens the gate to their enclosure and manoeuvres through their fenced area of land carefully. She fills her basket with eggs before evacuating the coop and leaving the chickens to feed. 

Right before heading back up to the house to cook up the eggs for breakfast, she refills the pigs’ troughs and peeks in on the horses to make sure they've stayed within their enclosure and not wandered beyond their limits. 

Wednesday’s don’t amount to much on the farm. There’s not much more to do than routine upkeep; brushing down the horses, feeding the animals and tending to her beloved vegetable garden. The cows require little upkeep, and she only ever really needs to tend to them during calf season, so she leaves then be after a thorough sweeping of their barn. Dasher rounds up their small herd of sheep and Darcy shears their coats to prepare them for the upcoming summer heat, putting aside the sheepskin to recycle into a new rug for one of the spare rooms in the main house. By the time she makes her way back around to the stable’s, the sun is starting to set over the horizon. 

One of her older horses, Gabe, requires a daily trot to keep his muscles from seizing up, but Darcy has never been keen on keeping any of her stallion's from running free. So, she opens their stables and lets them trot onto the pasture, joining their young. The only reason she didn't let them run free all day was because she couldn't keep an eye on them while tending to the rest of her errands. It's joyous to see them run, not as lithe as they'd once been, but gracious nonetheless. 

By the time she stumbles back into the house that evening, cheeks flushed red from the hours of sun exposure, she startles upon hearing her landline beeping rhythmically. For a moment, her blood runs cold. There are only four people in the nine-realms who know her landline number. One is off-world; one is in the middle of the Arctic on an eight-month-long research trip, one she hasn’t spoken to in four years and the other-- 

Darcy practically trips over her own feet as she throws herself at the wall-mounted phone. Her hands tremble as she reverses the call, holding the phone up to her ear and leaning against the wall. She takes a handful of deep breaths, the dial tone deafening against the silence of the farmhouse. 

Finally, _finally_ , the dial tone halts and her breath catches in her throat. 

It takes a mighty surge of courage to actually speak their well-practised code out-loud. There are tears pooling in her eyes, blurring her vision. 

“If you could only eat bananas for the rest of your life, how would you eat them?” 

“Burnt as hell.” 

Clint. It’s actually Clint. 

She hasn’t heard the archers voice since the last time he called; six months ago. He’d been contemplating retirement, had even asked if she’d mind him moving onto the farm, but then he’d fallen off the grid. She was left in the dark for all that time. The news could only keep her minorly informed as to what was happening. 

Since they’d last spoken, Shield had fallen. Hydra had been exposed. Every Shield file had been published online and, consequently, Project Insight had been exposed. Ultron had destroyed Sokovia. The Accords had torn the Avengers apart and, to top it all off, Clint and his team had been declared war criminals after breaking out of federal imprisonment. 

For a while, she’d been forced to accept the fact that she might not ever hear from him again. So, to actually hear his voice, to know he was alive and kicking-- 

Darcy sobs before she can stop herself. 

“I can’t believe it’s actually you.” She chokes out, tears streaming steadily down her cheeks now. Dasher whines from the kitchen, his sensitive ears raising. Darcy waves a hand in his direction, trying to communicate the fact that she was okay. He whines again before resting his head back on his paws with a huff. 

“Well, you better believe it, sweet-cheeks.” Clint quips, voice hitching at the end. Darcy doesn’t need to see him to know that he’s getting emotional. Not as much as she is, but emotional nonetheless. “You been keeping up with the news?” 

“Impossible not to, even out here. Your face is everywhere, Clint. Nat’s too. They want your head on a stake.” Darcy takes a shaky breath, pushing her head back against the wall and closing her eyes. “Where are you? Are you safe? Please tell me you’re not doing anything stupid. It isn’t just the US Government after you, Clint, it’s the rest of the world too.” 

“We know what we’re doing, Darce. We’re taking it one day at a time. Nat has experience and we’ve all been trained to survive this type of ordeal. Maybe not to this extent, but still.” He chuckles weakly, and Darcy cracks a smile. “But seriously, we’re okay. We’re doing our best with what we’ve got.” He insists, but Darcy isn't convinced. “Hey, I can hear you worrying. Stop it. I’m fine. Nat is fine.” 

“And the rest of your team?” She asks, already dreading the answer. She knows they’re not dead, that would’ve been reported by now, but she has no idea what shape they’re in. 

Clint takes a sharp breath. There’s a pregnant pause before he starts. “Sweet-cheeks, I-” 

“Yes.” She interrupts him immediately. She doesn’t think twice. She should, Thor has had to scold her more than once for not thinking things through before diving in head-first. But this isn’t like taking apart her washer because it’s making a funny noise and then having no idea how to put it back together. This is two people she considers family (and their team) needing refuge, and she’ll be damned if she denies them it. 

It’s not exaggerating to say that nowhere is as safe as her farm. It’s off the grid, self-sustaining, and ridiculously protected in every sense of the word. Forcing herself to breathe evenly, she straightens her posture and opens her eyes. “ETA?” 

A sigh of relief echoes down the line. 

Darcy chews on her lip anxiously. 

“I can get us there in seven days, I think. Some of us—some of us aren’t in the best shape, but we’ll get there. We will. No matter how long it takes.” He doesn’t explain anything further. No details, no specifics. Darcy understands why. 

So she nods, digesting the information. Dasher, bored of waiting for her to return to the kitchen, wanders into the hallway and circles her legs before collapsing into a heap of limbs on her Ugg-Boot clad feet. “Okay- okay. Seven days, maybe longer.” She reiterates. “I’ll be ready.” 

“Fuck,” his breath trembles. “I don’t know what to say.” 

“You don’t need to say anything. Just get here safely; all of you. I won’t have you dragging dead superheroes onto my farm.” She says, light-hearted but serious. Clint stays quiet. “You know the code to the gate. You let yourselves in, okay? Day or night. I’ll be expecting you at my door, I’ll have Dasher prepared. All you have to do is get here; let me worry about the rest. Okay?” 

“You’re a fucking angel, you know that?” Clint says, resolute. Darcy hears a crash in the background and Clint curses. “I need to go, Darce. Are you completely sure about this? I mean- this might not be a temporary thing. I don’t know how long we’re going to need to lay low. Might be months, might be years.” 

“I know what I’m signing up for,” Darcy says, and it’s not a lie, exactly. She can’t say for sure what the repercussions of taking in and harbouring a handful of war criminals might be, but she knows that this isn’t a temporary rest-stop. Once they’re here, they don’t have anywhere else. This could be an arrangement that lasts decades, if not a lifetime. 

She closes her eyes and takes a measuring breath. “Clint?” 

“Hm?” 

“Is Barnes with you?” 

There’s a lapse of silence before Clint finally speaks again. “Yeah. He is.” 

Darcy swallows thickly. “Okay.” 

There’s another brief pause. “Okay?” 

Darcy nods, even though he can’t see her, and smiles weakly. “Okay.” 

Clint chuckles, almost silently. Darcy barely catches it. “I’ll see you on the flipside, sweet-cheeks.” 

“Can’t wait, handsome.” She chokes out, and before she can even think to tell him to stay safe, the line goes dead. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Left reeling after the phonecall, Darcy goes about preparing the farm for her guests' forthcoming arrival.

The week that follows the phone call is hectic, to say the least.

Darcy gets virtually no sleep after hooking the landline back up to the wall and forcing herself to go to bed. For the first time since settling into his nest in the kitchen beneath the table, Dasher must sense her jitters, because he climbs into bed with her and spends the night tucked up to her side. Despite the comfort his presence provides, daylight is already creeping around the curtains by the time she finally drifts off.

Running on four hours of sleep, she doesn’t get much done that following day. She feeds the animals and waters her vegetable patches and stops off to keep the cow's company for a while. But instead of spending the entire day tending to her land, like she usually would, by mid-afternoon she’s curled up at the kitchen table, planning out everything that needs to be done before Clint, Nat and their team arrives. 

She bullet-points the errands she needs to run, writes out a detailed shopping list and even decides to, at some point, climb up into the attic and dust off the archery set Clint had trained her with. She knows he’ll be riled up for a few days after he arrives, and sending him off with a target and some arrows has always proved to be the best way to get him to unwind.

Nat takes baths, Clint shoots arrows. Darcy briefly wonders what the others do to make themselves comfortable, but doesn’t dwell on the thought for long. 

She sleeps well that night. Dasher retreats to his own bed once again and Darcy sleeps better for it. She loves the pup, she really does, but he gives off heat like a radiator when he’s sleeping and she can barely stand it. 

The next day, Saturday, as it turns out, Darcy pulls her car out of the garage for the first time in months. She worries over the strange growling noise it makes after she starts it up, but puts it down to old age and dust in the engine when it ultimately silences. Carrie, her Volvo, is an old girl, but she’s discreet and a decently smooth ride. Darcy can’t ask for much more than that. 

The nearest supermarket is a two-hour drive, so Darcy settles behind the wheel and relies on her beloved iPod playlist to keep her entertained for the duration. The roads are pretty clear and she doesn’t get stuck in traffic even once, which is a miracle given it’s a Saturday and the roads are often congested on the weekend. 

Once she’s at to the store, she pulls out her list and gets to work. She fills her cart with new bedspreads, towels and even a bundle of cotton pyjamas. She gets a handful of each size, both genders, unsure but determined. Ultimately, she heads to the grocery section of the store and works on replenishing her canned and dried food inventory. She even splashes out on a few bottles of top-shelf whiskey, a gift from herself to herself.

Once she’s checked out and tucked the receipt into her back pocket, she heads straight back to the farm. Driving out to any store is a rare necessity. The farm is as self-sustaining as Darcy can possibly make it, but there are just certain luxuries that make the four-hour round trip worth it. Like whiskey, and fluffy Hello Kitty slippers. 

The storage cellar isn’t necessarily in short supply, per se, but Darcy has a feeling that feeding a group of superheroes could very quickly become a big undertaking. If what Clint had mentioned to her in passing was true, supersoldiers eat like there’s no tomorrow, and Darcy’s about to be providing for not just one, but two of them. 

That thought stops her in her tracks in the middle of putting away the groceries. 

To be completely honest, she was ignorant of a lot of the facts surrounding the Avengers’ fallout. All she knew about the elusive Sokovia Accords was what the news had reported over the past few months. And that wasn’t much. The basics were clear, though. Half of the Avengers were for signing the Accords and complying with the government's demands, whereas the other half (Clint’s half), were vehemently against them. And then, well, this is when the panic sets in. She’d given Clint permission to bring the fucking Winter Soldier to her beloved farm, and she didn’t know how to handle the idea of a world famous assassin sleeping in her house. 

And the worst part about it? She actually knows nothing about him; well, actually, that’s a lie. She knows his name, and the fact that he was Steve’s friend back during the war. But other than that? Nada. The news was her only source of information when it came to him, and all they ever seemed to do was label him. 

Some called him a mass murderer, others preferred the term assassin (Darcy used that one in her head, but she put that down to her past experiences with Natasha), and then some were going as far as labelling him a terrorist. It’s nerve-wracking, knowing that she’s invited an ex-hydra assassin into her home, but she trusts Clint with her life. He could press a loaded gun to her head and she'd remain unconditionally confident that he’d never actually hurt her. So, yeah, the fact that he’s the one bringing the Winter Soldier eases her nerves. Slightly. 

Darcy has a lot of questions for Clint. 

She has a lot of questions for her dad, too. That’s the worst part. And fuck, all she wants is to hear his side of the story, but he hasn’t contacted her in four months. And even then, he’d only called to tell her to stay away from him and to not attempt to contact him again. So, as much as she wanted to speak to him, to see him, even, she knew it wasn’t an option anymore. A line had been drawn between them and as much as it hurt, she wasn’t going to cross it. 

Darcy continues to unpack the tinned goods into the cellar. Looking past her nerves, she’s actually looking forward to having some company. She spends a lot of time alone, and as much as she loves the tranquillity her farm provides; it's easy to get lonely. Her animals are wonderful companions, but they're not a substitute for real human company. 

Plus, it’s been almost four months since she’s had the chance to cook for someone other than herself and Dasher. The feast she’d thrown for Jane before she flew out to the Arctic Circle was mighty, but time had passed since then quickly. 

Once everything has been packed away, Darcy puts a pot of stew on the stove, packed full of fresh vegetables from the garden. While it simmers, she opens up her laptop and, having reminded herself of Jane while thinking about cooking, begins to type out her bi-weekly email to the astrophysicist. She raves about her cucumber patch and how bright her tomatoes are, goes on for a paragraph and a half about how much she misses her, talks about the animals for a while, and then her hands freeze over the keyboard. 

She wants to tell Jane about the fact that Clint and Nat are on their way to the farm with the remnants of their team, but she can’t. It’s not safe. Emails are quite possibly the least secure form of communication. Period. After a moment of hesitation, Darcy starts a new paragraph asking Jane what she thinks about the idea of building the chickens a bigger coop. 

It feels wrong and keeping something so significant from Jane makes her skin crawl, but Darcy pushes through to the end of the email and sends it off with ten kisses and nine love hearts. She misses her best friend. 

She misses Thor too, come to think of it. But he’s been off-world for as long as she can remember and the last time she’d tried to talk to him through Heimdall, she hadn’t gotten as much as a gust of wind in response.

She has a sour feeling about his absence, but he’s the strongest person she knows, figuratively and literally. He’ll show up again, sooner or later. He’ll ruin her grass and apologise with hugs and Asgardian herbs, like he always does. 

Darcy just knows it. 

When she settles into bed that night with a stomach full of stew and freshly baked bread, she falls asleep the second her head hits the pillow. The next day, Sunday is spent cleaning out a handful of guest rooms. Darcy’s never been a big fan of cleaning, but there’s not exactly anyone else around to pass the buck to, and so she blasts her music and gets on with it. She dusts, polishes, vacuums and even goes as far as to clean the windows. She puts the new linens she bought from the store on the sheets, puts a few pairs of pyjamas in each of the closets and tucks away a few of the new towels in each bathroom. The rooms aren’t perfect, but they’re warm and safe and she knows that, alone, is enough. 

The day is over in the blink of an eye. Forgoing dinner after having a late lunch, she saddles up one of her younger mare’s, Hattie, and takes her for a gallop around the fields. She rides well into the night, every inch of built-up tension oozing from her muscles. She sleeps well that night.

Monday is less demanding, but still busy nonetheless. She cleans out the muck from the pigsty and sweeps out the cows’ barn. She carries fresh haybale’s from the back of the storage barn to each of the animal pens and freshens everything up. She brushes down the horses and cleans out the stables, collects two baskets of eggs from the chickens and decides, conclusively, that the chicken coop is definitely in need of some sort of expansion. She wonders whether Clint might be up for building her a new hutch once he’s settled in. He’d built the one that was still standing now, and would probably still be useable in a decade, but her chickens had just outgrown the space. They needed more room to roam. 

Huffing out an exhausted breath after a long day of labour, Darcy collapses onto the couch. Reaching a hand up to touch her hair, she grimaces. It’s an oily mess; probably because it’s been a few days too long since she last washed it. She’s had bigger things to worry about than the state of her appearance. 

She spends an hour watching trashy reality TV before dragging herself upstairs and into the shower. She spends a good hour beneath the steaming water, singing along to her music and using a conditioner bottle as a makeshift microphone. Every so often, Dasher joins in with a quiet howl of his own from where he was standing guard outside the bathroom door. 

The normality of the routine makes her smile. 

Climbing into bed that night with her phone in her hand, she scrolls aimlessly through numerous social media feeds for an hour or so before her eyes begin to feel heavy. She’s just about to turn over and plug it in when a notification pops up at the top of the screen. It’s a twitter 'Breaking News' notification, and she clicks on it without thinking.

She’s not prepared for the headline that greets her. 

‘War Machine left paralysed from the waist down after calamitous airport battle.’ 

Her eyes glaze over and before she's completely calculated the risk of what she’s about to do (Thor, seriously, you’d be so disappointed), she’s holding her phone up to her ear and sitting on the edge of her bed, toes brushing rhythmically against the floor as the dial tone sounds. It takes five or six rings, she isn’t sure, before her call is answered. 

She parts her lips to speak, but is interrupted before she can.

“Darcy girl, you wanna tell me why the hell your old man is refusing to even acknowledge your existence?” 

Despite the pang his question sends through her heart, Darcy can’t help but smile wetly, because yeah, that’s her Uncle Rhodey, and he’s nothing if not a fighter. 

\---------- 

The next two days go by so fast that Darcy can’t quite believe it. She spends Tuesday cleaning the rest of the house and Wednesday is mainly spent cutting back grass and hedges. Even though it’s hard to believe, Thursday marks seven days since Clint’s phone call. Darcy spends the entire day looking over her shoulder, half expecting him to just appear out of thin air at any moment. 

Still, she does her best to just go about her day. Her to-do list is ticked off by three pm and with a good few hours left of the day on her hands, she decides to spend the rest of the day baking. Scones, Bakewell and even a handful of pies made with the fruit she’d had in the fridge that was about to turn, you name it.

By ten pm, the house was filled with the scent of pastries and freshly brewed jam. Dasher had been fed one too many samples of the treats and was sprawled out in his bed beneath the table, snoring powerfully. Darcy laughs as she places the cooled pies in the fridge, glancing at the dog over her shoulder and shaking her head fondly. 

And then, just as she’s moving back over to the sink to wash jam residue from her fingers, there are three knocks at the door. Dasher leaps up so fast that Darcy actually jumps, holding a hand over her heart as the Mastiff begins to bark and growl threateningly at the door. 

Calming her racing heart, Darcy grabs onto his collar and leads him to the door. She raises her hand and knocks five times, with a break between the third and fourth. There’s a few seconds pause before Clint’s confirming knock pattern is played on the door. Shoulders slumping, Darcy lets go of Dasher’s collar and throws the front door open as fast as she possibly can.

Darcy exhales shakily. “Holy fuck.” 

Stood at the front of the group, flanked by the members of his team, Clint rubs a hand over his face, a smirk tugging at his lips as he regards her. “Yeah, I know. This ain’t my best look, but trust me, once I straighten this up, I’ll be more handsome than ever.” 

Darcy laughs brokenly and throws herself into his arms, wrapping her arms around his neck and sniffling against his chest. Clint wraps his arms around her and squeezes her tightly. They stand there, swaying gently and just holding each other for a good thirty seconds before a sharp nail taps her shoulder. 

Freezing for a second, Darcy takes a small breath before pulling away from Clint and spinning on her heel. And yes, there she was, in all her glory, Natasha fucking Romanoff. 

The widow looks her up and down with a tut. “You aren’t carrying. That’s foolish. We could’ve been anyone.” 

Darcy holds eye contact with her as she reaches behind her back and pulls a pocket knife out of the back of her pants. After a moment of stillness, she leaps forward and drives her wrist out and shoves the blunt side against Nat’s ribs without a second of hesitation. “Boom. Lung ruptured. You're immobile.” 

Natasha, _finally_ , smiles. Darcy lowers the knife and pockets it in a more obvious place this time. Natasha pulls her into a hug, breathing against her shoulder. “Oh, I have missed you.”

After a few seconds, someone coughs. Darcy pulls away from the hug with a sheepish grin and looks over at the group of fugitives on her porch. Clint stands just to the left of the front door, brushing a hand over Dasher’s back. Natasha lingers at Darcy’s side. 

Darcy flushes, not used to being the centre of attention, but refuses to buckle beneath the pressure. She regards the group with a small smile, that quivers when she scans over them, because holy shit that’s Captain fucking America, the Winter fucking Soldier, the Scarlet Witch and the Falcon, wanted fugitives, stood on her front porch. 

She blinks. “Hi, I’m Darcy. This is my farm.” 

Clint snorts. Natasha simply smirks. 

Captain fucking America, Darcy seriously has to stop referring to him as that, steps forward with a weary smile. “We can’t thank you enough for your kindness, Darcy. You didn’t need to open your home to us, but you have.” He laughs roughly. “You’ve got no idea how much we appreciate it. All of us.” 

Darcy feels her nerves begin to diminish. In their place, sympathy begins to rise. “Yeah- yeah, of course. I won’t try to act like I know what any of you have been through, because I have no idea, not really. But that doesn’t mean I won’t do my best to make you feel like you’re safe here. Because you are. Maybe not forever, but at least for now.” She wrings her hands together nervously. “I set up a guest room for each of you. Nat, Clint, your room is just as you left it.” She says, and Natasha nods in gratitude. Clint simply continues cooing over Dasher. “You all have an en-suite. They’re not much, but they’ve all got a shower and a basin, at least.”

“None of us have slept in an actual bed in over a month, Darce.” Nat says, resting a hand on her shoulder. “Anything is better than nothing. You won’t be hearing any complaints from us.” 

Darcy nods and takes a steadying breath. “Okay, uh- you can all follow me inside? I’d appreciate it if you'd take off your shoes, but if you don’t want to, that’s okay.” She walks into the house, Dasher hot on her heels. “Nat, Clint, you guys know where to go. Wanda,” at the sound of her name, the Scarlett Witch looks up from the ground for the first time since Darcy had laid eyes on her. There’s a distance in her eyes that makes Darcy’s heart shatter. She looked like she was in so much pain. “Your room is right beside Nat and Clint’s. I put some pyjamas in the cabinet, they’re clean. You have a towel in your bathroom, too.” Wanda stares at her with parted lips. Darcy smiles sadly. “You can help yourself to anything. It’s all there for you. Soap, clothes, everything. That goes for the rest of you, too.” 

Darcy looks pointedly at the three men stood close together. They all stare at her with varying degrees of astonishment. Barnes just looks put-out, though it’s hard to tell beneath his thick fringe of hair. Steve’s mouth is practically gaping and Sam gawks with stars in his eyes. 

Cheeks flushing again, she looks down at her feet. It shocks everyone when Wanda speaks through the silence. “You have done so much for us. Why?” 

Darcy looks at her easily. “Anyone Clint trusts, I trust. If he says you’re good people, I’ll treat you like good people unless you prove otherwise.”

Wanda blinks but doesn’t speak again. 

Sam whistles lowly. “Damn, girl. Where the hell did Barton find you?” 

Darcy looks at him with a lopsided smirk. “New Mexico.” Without elaborating, she continues. “Alright, come on. You all look like you could do with a hot shower. Now, you don't gotta worry about the water, I’ve got three huge tanks. Unless all of you spend hours in there, we won’t be running out anytime soon.” She assures them, leading them upstairs. Nat and Clint push open the door to their room and obviously remembering what Darcy had told her, Wanda walks through the door next to theirs. 

The girl freezes in the doorway for a moment before taking a hesitant step into the room. Leaving her to settle into her surroundings, Darcy turns back to the men and waves her hand around for a second before pointing out the three other doors leading off of the hallway. “There are three more rooms, practically identical. You can take your pick.” 

There’s a pause of movement before Sam takes the lead and moves to open the door closest to where he was standing. He strolls into the bedroom and spends a moment looking around before looking back at her with wide eyes. “Jesus, this place is cleaner than any damn hotel I’ve ever been to.” 

Clint laughs from the doorway to his and Nat’s room, watching the scene play out carefully. “I told you it’d be pristine. She’s a people pleaser through and through.” 

“Shut your hole, Barton.” Darcy glares at him out of the corner of her eye before settling her gaze on the two super soldiers whose eyes were trained on her. Steve looked plain shocked and Barnes, James, Bucky, Darcy has no idea what he wants to be called, just stares at her blankly. Taking the lead, she manoeuvres around them and pushes open both doors. 

Steve, finally, unfreezes and takes initiative, casting Barnes a look before walking into the first door. Barnes just continues to stare at her with impressive intensity. 

Unsure of how to handle the situation she's found herself in, Darcy just stares back at him for an uncomfortable amount of time before squeaking out, “I made a lot of pie.” 

One eyebrow raises. The first movement she’s seen the man make. He observes her for another minute as her cheeks burn a bright red before turning on the heel of his boot and walking into the same room as Steve. 

Darcy blinks away the shock clouding her vision before looking up and meeting Clint’s highly amused gaze. She glares at him viciously and hisses, “no fucking pie for you.” 

He doesn’t even try to suppress the high-pitched whine that falls from between his lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> your questions will be answered soon, don't worry.  
> this is only the beginning of what is bound to be a very very long fic <3

**Author's Note:**

> clint barton is the loml  
> that is all.


End file.
